by Myke Cole
“Sir,” Ghaznavi began, “I can’t risk your—”
“Sorry, Grampy,” Mankiller cut her off. “We got a colonel from the Army down in town, too. They can’t decide which of ’em is in charge and can’t get it through their heads that it’s neither.”
“Listen—” Spots of color appeared on Ghaznavi’s cheeks.
“I’ve done just about enough listenin’ to you,” Mankiller said. “Time for you to listen. Grampy wants to come back to town, he comes back to town. You want to jump up and down and cry about it, well, suit yourself.”
Ghaznavi stuttered, shot a pleading glance at Schweitzer. “What are you looking at me for?” he asked. “I can barely move and it sounds like I’m about to get incinerated.”
“I’m comin’ with,” Grampy said. “No safer here than with you, maybe less safe since I’m alone. Besides, might be I can do some good.”
“Sir—” Ghaznavi began.
“Yah,” Grampy said, standing up. “Now, ladies, if you wouldn’t mind excusing us, I need to ask you to step outside for a moment. Jim and I need to talk.”
“About what?” Ghaznavi asked, but she stood at least. Mankiller was grateful for that.
“If I’m gonna chase a spirit into the void and bring it back with me, I need some way to find it. I need to know him. With the tháydÿne, they’re people I grown up with, or at least been close to. You”—he pointed at Schweitzer—“I just met.”
“Okay,” Schweitzer said slowly. “How do we fix that?”
“You and I are gonna talk, and I’m afraid it’s gonna have to be pretty deep, and we don’t have time to go slow. That’s why I’m puttin’ these ladies out in the cold for a spell.”
“C’mon.” Mankiller took Ghaznavi’s elbow. “He knows what he’s about. You gotta trust him.”
Ghaznavi sighed, heaved the door open, and winced at the blast of frigid air that swept over them. The tháydÿne were gathered outside, sitting in a loose delta, burning eyes fixed on the women emerging into the bitter cold. Ghaznavi stepped out and winced again as Grampy shut the door behind her, leaned against it. “I know they’re family, but they freak me the fuck out.”
“They won’t hurt you,” Mankiller said, stepped between the creatures and Ghaznavi. The truth was that they freaked her out too, but she sure as heck wasn’t going to tell Ghaznavi that now. Instead, she knelt and held out a hand to one. “This one’s my cousin . . . like twenty times removed, I think.” The wolf sniffed at her fingers tentatively, gave a decidedly un-wolflike twitch of its head, and backed away.
“Your cousin-like-twenty-times-removed seems unfriendly. Anyway, it doesn’t matter. We’re both going to freeze to death long before anything else can hurt us.”
They stood shivering, staring at the eerily silent wolf pack who sat unblinking and stared back. There was no sign of the bear. Mankiller supposed it might still be on the shack’s roof, but she didn’t want to break the strange staring contest to look up. The only sounds were the gentle sigh of the wind and the low murmur of Grampy’s voice, barely audible through the cabin walls.
At last, the door scraped open and Grampy appeared, dragging Schweitzer by his armpits. “Jesus, this guy’s heavy.”
Mankiller and Ghaznavi rushed to help. “His bones are mostly metal,” Ghaznavi said.
“Well, that’s damn disappointin’.” Grampy gratefully let Schweitzer fall into Mankiller’s hands, put a hand to his back, and winced his way over to a low bowl a few feet from the shack, where he proceeded to kick away the snow to reveal patches of black, charred ground covered in a thin rime of ice.
“If you’d be so kind, could I trouble you to run some wood out here?” Grampy asked Ghaznavi. “We’ll take it in shifts.”
Mankiller laid Schweitzer beside the pit and then retrieved Grampy’s pickaxe from underneath the frozen tarp where he kept his tools. Unasked, she set to breaking up the ice and clearing away the snow. The wolves silently ringed the pit, sitting at the edge of the clearing, attentive and rigid, like cultists at some religious rite.
And in a way, Mankiller supposed they were. She glanced over at Schweitzer. “Hope this works. If it does, you gonna have to tell Joe that I’m sorry.”
“Sorry for what?” Schweitzer asked. He was half-buried in snow and chipped ice by now, and looked nothing like the giant thing Mankiller had first met, as if some fundamental part of him was missing.
Mankiller paused, leaned on the pickaxe. “For sendin’ him out. For not thinkin’ of a better way. For puttin’ him out there where he could get dunked in that lake. For not goin’ with him. Heck, tell him I’m sorry for every time I yelled at him. Tell him I’m sorry I made fun of him for Nora. Tell him . . . Just tell him he was the best damn deputy I ever had and a good friend, and I’m real sorry he . . . wound up like this.” Saying the words brought the grief racing up into her throat, and Mankiller was grateful that the cold had made her eyes tear up already. Still, the last few words came out hoarse.
“Sheriff”—Schweitzer’s voice was surprisingly gentle—“I’m not even in his body yet, and I am already one hundred percent certain that he knows all that.”
“Yeah.” Mankiller sniffed, cuffed at her nose. “Well, you jus’ make sure you tell him anyway. Jus’ in case.”
“You can tell him yourself,” Schweitzer said. “Back before I drove Ninip out, we shared my body. Both of us could drive, move the arms, or use the mouth to talk. Kind of like being a Siamese twin, I guess.”
“And that’s what it’ll be like when you’re in there?” Mankiller danced out of the way as Ghaznavi and Grampy showed up, gratefully dumped armloads of wood into the pit, and turned wordlessly back to the house.
“Search me,” Schweitzer said. “I’m new to this whole dead-reanimated-by-magic thing.”
At last, the fire pit was piled high with wood. Mankiller remembered the last time they’d built one here, the last time they’d held a Stickdance. That had been a time to mourn, but it had also been a time of peace and joy. Doing it now, under the grim shadow of the threat to her home, Mankiller felt her stomach clench.
She nodded to Ghaznavi and stood at Schweitzer’s feet. They lifted him between them, swung him back and forth. “Sorry,” Ghaznavi grunted. “This isn’t terribly dignified.”
“Just get it done,” Schweitzer said. With a final heave, they threw him on top of the wood. There was a brief moment where the insult of rolling down the other side might have been added to the injury of being thrown like a sack of rocks, but Schweitzer was able to stick out his arm and steady himself.
Mankiller stepped back. “You okay?” she asked.
“Not really,” Schweitzer said. “I’m dead and broken pretty much in half.”
“Well, we’re aimin’ to fix that,” Grampy said, dragging out his cot, with Yakecan bouncing along as he went. Once again, Mankiller and Ghaznavi raced to help him, and once again, he gratefully stood aside and let them.
Grandma’s tháydÿne stood in the doorway, blanket still over her back, watching.
Grampy doused the wood with kerosene next, splashing it out from a jerry can that looked like it was last used in World War II. The acrid fumes tickled Mankiller’s nose, and Schweitzer twitched as the liquid splashed across him.
At last, Grampy stood back, grunted in satisfaction, and produced a plastic lighter. He touched the marble-sized flame to a long wooden punk, held it up. “You ready? Wind’s blowin’ right through the base, so it’ll go up like a torch once I put this in.”
“Hey, Jala,” Schweitzer said.
“Yeah?”
“I hope this works.”
“Me too.”
“So say we all,” Grampy said, knelt, and thrust the burning brand home.
CHAPTER XVII
BRAVE NEW WORLD
Schweitzer died for the second time.
His dead nerves r
eported the pain but without any involuntary reaction, and he was free to ignore it or pay attention as he chose. He ignored the pain, focused instead on the bizarre sensation of his flesh changing state, the glycerol boiling away, the meat of him expanding and bursting and finally drying and shrinking, at long last turning to ash and vapor and blowing away.
The first time he’d died, he had been completely focused on his enemy, on the gun barrel jammed under his chin, on the terrible realization that he had lost. Now, he realized with a twinge of doleful humor, there was nothing left to lose. Sarah was dead. Patrick was a world away, and there was no guarantee that he’d even be able to locate Eldredge even if he had a working body to do it.
It was oddly liberating. With nothing left to strive for, Schweitzer had only to let his body go, to will himself skyward as smoke and ash borne on the fire’s dancing updraft. There was only the aurora above him, the crisp bite of the freezing air, the high, chemical stink of glycerol and humectants boiling out into gas, and beneath it all, the savory scent of cooking meat, the last of the real James Schweitzer, going up in smoke.
At last, he felt his extremities burning away, the bones of his legs and his remaining arm blackening and turning to ash. The mechanical one had been removed at Ghaznavi’s insistence, lay propped against the cabin’s side. Even now he felt no different, even as his torso burned up and collapsed, so that he could see his blackened ribs smoking in the freezing air. What if it doesn’t work? What if I’m trapped in whatever charred remains are left? The thought brought a stab of worry but only briefly. It made no difference. He would be useless either way.
But at last, he felt the flesh around his head consumed by the hungry flames, the metal armature of his skull cooled by the whipping wind. His consciousness came untethered, a pleasant feeling of drifting, loosening. It’s my eyes, he thought. That’s what’s finally burning. The fire consumed by fire, or at least the flesh that held those fires in place. So, that’s where the soul lives, he thought, amazed. It was in the eyes. He remembered the passage from the Bible, the gospel of St. Matthew: The lamp of the body is the eye, if, therefore, thine eye may be perfect, all thy body shall be enlightened. It made him want to laugh. Fuckers got something right.
But he couldn’t laugh, because the world was fading now, and the aurora was drowning in an inky blackness so complete that it forbade even the thought of light. Schweitzer was caught in a current, an immense undertow reeling him in, faster and farther. Schweitzer didn’t fight it, let the current carry him along, floating peacefully, until the blissful darkness was contaminated with a glowing light line, growing larger on the horizon. The first faint screams reached him.
Schweitzer lifted his spiritual head to greet the soul storm sweeping him into its bosom, calling him home. It was a chaos of tortured, tumbling souls, mixing and churning until madness claimed them, until all that was human in them was scoured away. It was as close as he’d ever come to hell, but he greeted it gladly.
Because he knew that Sarah was somewhere in that maelstrom. The scent of her rosewater perfume was suddenly thick in his spiritual nostrils, and he knew in that moment that he would surely be able to find her, that even in the midst of the chaos, he would claw his way to her side. No doubt half the souls in the storm were missing loved ones, but he doubted any of them had such a clear trail to follow. Beside her, he would be close enough to hear her voice above the tumult, close enough for her to hear him, close enough to tell her how sorry he was, and how much she meant to him, and how . . .
Jim.
Schweitzer felt his drifting slow. He was being tugged backward. A gentle but insistent pull.
Jim. You know me. Turn around.
Schweitzer didn’t want to turn around. Not when Sarah was so close. He sucked greedily at the scent of her perfume and tried to stay the course. But in spite of himself, he felt his consciousness rotating until he faced back the way he’d come.
A blue road stretched out before him, the stark color ugly in the midst of the quiet black. It stretched off into the distance, arrow-straight as far as his spiritual eyes could see. Schweitzer knew what lay at the other end of it, an old man with leathery skin and kind eyes, sitting beside a bonfire that was taking in what little remained of Schweitzer’s old form.
Jim, Plante whispered to him across the strange miles between this world and the one Jim had known. Come back.
The screaming grew fainter as Plante pulled harder and the soul storm slowly lost the tug-of-war. The scent of Sarah’s perfume grew weaker, and Schweitzer found himself fighting against Plante’s insistent tugging. Schweitzer knew he should let the old man bring him back, that he had something he was supposed to do, though he couldn’t remember exactly what it was. All he knew for certain was that Sarah was somewhere behind him. All that Plante could offer was the bitter cold, the biting wind, and the company of strangers.
No. Schweitzer sent the thought down the blue ribbon to the old man at the far end. I’m staying here.
What’s your rush? Plante’s voice was full of warm mirth. You got all the time in the world to be dead. But first, you should finish up the stuff you need to be alive for.
Why wait? Schweitzer answered. Besides, I’m already dead.
Not for long. Come on back and let me show you.
No. Schweitzer pulled harder. She’s here; I can smell her perfume. I can find her.
You can find her later. You need to find Patrick now. Patrick is your son. Do you remember him? Do you remember that he needs you to care for him?
Schweitzer said nothing, but neither did he come willingly, pulling against the old man’s magic as hard as he could, and succeeding only in staying put.
Do you remember what you told me when we were alone in the cabin, Jim? That dead thing that’s running the Cell is your brother. It’s Peter, Jim. You can’t leave him here. You can’t go until he’s dealt with.
Schweitzer felt his consciousness jerk at the words, a cold fire growing in his spiritual belly, rising through his chest until it choked him. He remembered now, Peter’s words on the chapel roof: I knew from the day I was born that I was going to be the greatest warrior-king the world had ever known.
And this above all: The age of the living is over, Jim. Welcome to the dawn of the dead.
Yes, Plante said. He said that, and he meant it. Your brother’s aiming high. It’s not just Patrick now, Jim. It’s all of us. You can delay gratification for a few measly years for that. Souls are eternal. Your wife’s not going anywhere. Come back and finish this.
And Schweitzer felt himself moving now, no longer resisting the old man’s pull. The screaming grew fainter and finally silenced, but the scent of rosewater lingered, staying with him all the way down until he felt himself at the very limit of the void and the hard edges of something poised to admit him.
Work with me, Jim, Plante said. Step inside.
Schweitzer did. He felt his consciousness slip past the edges and into the dark interior space he had once known. It was the inside of a body, like his own that he had shared with Ninip, but where his corpse had been dark and silent, this place thundered with life. The walls of Schweitzer’s new home reverberated with a pounding pulse, hammering in a steady rhythm that he knew could only be a heartbeat. He could feel the searing heat of the living blood; could smell the teeming colonies of bacteria, the bouquet of fields of gut flora; could hear the song of a billion cells dividing and dying, dividing and dying, over and over again. Life was hot and noisy.
Schweitzer was stunned, the jackhammer chorus of Yakecan’s living body tossing him like a boat in a storm. He felt the cool peace of the void just outside the edges of Yakecan’s body, beckoning him with its placid silence. He could just duck out there for a moment, suck down some more of Sarah’s rosewater scent, gather himself for another try.
But he felt Plante’s magic ushering him along. He could scarcely hear the old man’s voice
through the spiritual din, but he didn’t need to. He knew it was warning him, reminding him that if he moved out of Yakecan’s inner space and back into the void, he would never return. This was a one-way ticket. He either stayed in the fight or he let the void claim him forever. Focus, Schweitzer told himself. It’s about the mission, not you. If going under the hammer of Yakecan’s pulsing heart was what it took to see this through, then that was what he would do.
He gritted his spiritual teeth, reached out for Yakecan. As far as he knew, the magic worked on the pairing of souls. Schweitzer was the only one who occupied his body alone. No, Peter is the same as you. The thought shook him nearly as much as the realization that he had no body now. All that remained of him was smoking gristle and ash atop the bonfire. He was a guest in Yakecan’s body now, and like all polite guests, he would let the host know that he’d arrived.
Even in the midst of the tumult, Yakecan proved easy to find. When Schweitzer was paired with Ninip, he had pictured the presence as a blackness coiled about him. Sometimes the jinn looked like a slit-eyed serpent, sometimes as he had been in life, armored in bronze, tall, olive complected, his hair in oiled ringlets.
Yakecan also appeared as he had in life, exactly so. The image Schweitzer received when he contacted Yakecan’s soul was of the tall, burly man seated cross-legged and naked in a spring field, surrounded by sprays of tiny flowers, grinning placidly into the distance.
Joe Yakecan, Schweitzer said. I’m Jim Schweitzer. Your boss sent me. I need your help.
But Schweitzer knew before he spoke that Yakecan wasn’t listening. There was a feeling to the presence, to Yakecan’s soul. It was resident, clearly tied to the life that thundered all about it, but its spiritual eyes were fixed on the far horizon, on the void that coiled outside the edges of Yakecan’s physical being.
Yakecan, Schweitzer said again. Come on, man. Wake up.
But Joe Yakecan did not wake up. His soul looked out into the void, the idiot grin fixed on its childlike face, beaming amidst the blanket of flowers. Schweitzer gave him a spiritual nudge, got no response, and turned away. Maybe the shock to the system of Yakecan’s near-death experience had untethered his soul somehow. Maybe, like Schweitzer, he was aware of the noise and confusion of his own life now and sought the peace of the void as a refuge. Schweitzer didn’t know and probably never would. But he was certain that Yakecan was beyond him. He might share the physical space with Yakecan, but there would be no competition to control it. Assuming that Plante’s magic worked.